Hellfighters by Alexander Gordon Smith
Mammon was showing no sign of getting up. He lay there on the floor of the hurtling car, those headlamps blazing at the ceiling. The train was shaking hard, pieces of the building ripped away by the wind. Something cold dropped onto Pan’s neck, squirming down the back of her shirt, and she grabbed for it—a maggot. More were falling now, a rain of them.
So be it, Mammon said.
“Wait!” she said again. The building up ahead was decomposing, fast, the bricks crumbling into writhing white larvae. Mammon himself was putrefying, like a slow-motion video of decay. His body puffed up, mold blossoming on his skin, erupting into maggot flesh.
So be it, he said again, and then the voice was gone.
Pan swore, tried to take a step toward Marlow only to find that her foot was sinking. The floor of the car was changing again, softening into rot. The poisonous smell of it was overwhelming, making her gag. Up ahead the top two floors of the building gave in, a mound of maggots—millions of them—spilling out into the night. The car was suddenly full of wind, kicking the rot into a tornado. Somehow the train was still moving, barreling into the darkness.
Right toward a bridge.
“We need to go,” Truck said, wheezing up beside her.
“Marlow, Night,” she yelled, “get up!”
They were trying, both of them swimming in the decaying remains of the car. She struggled to Night first, offering her a hand. By the time she was free Marlow was out, too, and they retreated together, into the next car back. Pieces of who-knew-what were thumping over the roof, the train shaking like a carnival ride. They had to be going at two hundred miles an hour—and with no actual engine. It was impossible.
More impossible than Mammon making a building grow from nothing?
“What did he want?” said Truck.
To help, she thought, but said, “Nothing, the asshole was just distracting us.”
“Any ideas?” said Marlow. The train thundered its way onto the bridge and Pan’s stomach almost erupted from her mouth. The floor was vibrating so much now she could barely stand. Sparks were still flying from the wheels, the world tearing past outside so fast that she couldn’t even look at it without screaming.
Any ideas?
The car bucked as something ripped under the wheels, hard enough to jolt them all off the floor.
“Yeah,” she said, gripping the nearest chair with everything she had. “Hang on.”
The train kicked again, the whole vehicle screaming. The struts of the bridge ripped past outside, too fast, and Pan had to screw her eyes shut against a crippling wave of vertigo. Then they lurched to the side and she was thrown across the aisle. Suddenly the car was tilting like a capsizing boat.
Hang on!
The train came off the rails, juddering as it punched through the side of the bridge. For an instant they were suspended in midair, Pan’s stomach turning inside out, then they were falling. She tumbled down the aisle, bouncing off the tops of the seats. Somebody grabbed her wrist and she felt something pop deep inside her shoulder, so painful that a grenade might have exploded there. Her body crunched to a halt and she blinked past the tears to see Marlow, clutching a chair with one hand and holding her with the other. She was almost grateful until she remembered that the car was still falling, plummeting toward whatever lay beneath the bridge, everything inside about to be crushed to a—
They snapped to a halt, the force almost pulling her free of Marlow’s grip. The car lurched a couple more times then swung gently, creaking like a church bell. Debris rained down from above, a corpse thudding down between the chairs. Pan watched it drop into the rotted remains of the engine. It ripped a hole right through it, falling into the night, toward the moonlit sheen of a river.
Maybe a hundred feet beneath them.
Pan swore beneath her breath, the waves of agony from her dislocated shoulder threatening to pull her into another kind of darkness.
“Hang on,” Marlow said, tightening his grip on the chair. He tried to yank her up and the scream burned from her lungs before she could stop it.
It was echoed by another one, somebody crying out as they fell from the car above. They spun down the aisle, snatching wildly at Pan before dropping into oblivion. The train trembled, then slid another few feet toward the river. How long before the car snapped free altogether?
Marlow pulled again, gently, guiding her onto the back of a seat. She scooted away from the edge, clutching her arm. Then he was there next to her, his face the color of ash.
“Where are the others?” she said.
“Here,” came Truck’s reply from somewhere overhead. “We’re good. Gonna try to make it into the next car.”
“Your arm?” said Marlow.
“Dislocated,” she said. She stretched herself out on the chair as best she could, grimacing as she held out her hand to Marlow. “Need you to pull it. Gently.”
Marlow made a face, but he took her hand and did as she asked. The world went white, every muscle in her shoulder crying out. The car juddered again, slipping further, but Marlow kept pulling, so hard she thought her arm would rip off like a chicken wing. Then, just like that, the joint slotted back into its socket. The relief of it was so great that she could have laughed. She shook free of his grip, sitting up. Every time the car swung she could see the route up, toward the door. It looked like a mountain.
But what choice did they have? It was either up or down.
Marlow was already on the move, grabbing the seat like a ladder.
“You need a hand?” he asked her.
“You need a black eye?” she replied, scowling. He rolled his eyes and swung himself up to the next seat. Pan ignored the niggling pain in her arm and followed him. Above her she could see Truck struggling, his face etched with concern and drenched with sweat. Night was already close to the door, climbing as gracefully as an acrobat.
The train dropped again without warning, the sound of shearing metal making her think there was a demon in the car. It snapped to a halt and the lights exploded into sparks, plunging them into darkness. Suddenly the outside world was there, drenched in moonlight. She could make out one of the immense columns, the bridge just overhead.
She pushed on, hauling herself up using the chairs and tables until she’d reached the top of the car. Marlow was there, one foot on either side of the door, and this time she accepted his hand, letting him pull her up beside him. She stood there for a moment, catching her breath and feeling his against her neck. She realized he was still holding her hand and she pulled it free.
“Perv,” she said, using the luggage rack to clamber into the next car. This one was at a forty-five-degree angle, making it easier to climb. Through the windows at the far end she could make out the bridge, illuminated by firelight. A haze of smoke hung in the air, layered with distant screams. Night and Truck had stopped to catch their breath, both of them wedged against a table.
“No hurry or anything,” said Truck, checking his watch. “Not like we’re on a train that’s about to drop us to our deaths.”
“I couldn’t go any faster,” she said, surprised by how much effort it took to get the words out. “Your fat ass was in the way.”
He laughed, holding out a hand the size of a bear’s paw. She batted it away, grabbing a fistful of his shirt and using it to haul herself past them.
“Don’t mind me,” he grumbled.
“I never do,” she said, putting a foot on his shoulder and pushing up. Not far now, another twenty yards or so. And her attention was so fixed on the exit that she didn’t see the person next to her until a weak hand wrapped itself around her arm. She choked back a scream and snatched her arm free, staring at a girl who couldn’t have been older than seventeen. She was curled up on a chair, her face a mask of terror.
“Help,” she said, reaching for Pan again.
“I…” Pan swallowed, looking up. She shook her head. “I can’t.”
She kept climbing. There was more at stake here than one girl—sacrifice one life t
“Please!” screamed the girl. “I’m scared!”
Join the club.
“It’s okay,” she heard Marlow say beneath her, and she didn’t have to look back to know what his big bleeding heart was doing.
“Thank you,” the girl said. “Oh God, thank you.”
Pan scaled the last couple of seats and reached the door. The glass had blackened, and when she grabbed the handle it was hot enough to make the flesh of her palm sizzle.
Dammit.
She shuffled across to the window, craning her neck to see that the next car along was a barbecue, flames erupting from the windows. Half of it jutted out from the bridge, the other half clamped in a dragon’s claw of broken railings and struts.
So close.
“We’re going to have to go out,” she said.
“Out?” replied Truck as he squashed in beside her. She pressed herself back against the seat so that he could punch the window, throwing himself at it until it popped out of its frame.
“Not having powers blows,” he said, sucking the blood from his knuckles. “I’m a three-hundred-pound weakling.”
Pan helped him push the glass free, watching as it dropped into the canyon below. Then she reached up and grabbed the top of the train, easing herself out. The drop beneath her felt Grand Canyon–deep, and she felt like somebody had reached into her stomach and was trying to tug it loose. She sucked it up, clambering frantically onto the sloping roof of the car. The wind whipped at her, screamed at her. Her sneakers slipped and for a moment she thought she was going, but she wedged one foot against an air vent to keep herself in place.
Truck’s face appeared and she moved out of the way to let him up. The next car was thankfully almost horizontal. The only problem was that parts of the metal roof ahead were glowing red hot, the air above it shimmering. It was a straight shot to the bridge, though, if they didn’t burn up before they got there.
“Any more ideas?” Truck asked from her side.
“Yeah, don’t stop,” she said. Truck’s sarcastic whistle was carried off by the wind.
“Man, you’re a fountain of good advice today, Pan,” he said.
Pan glanced over, found a scrap of smile to offer him. Past Truck, Marlow was doing his best to climb onto the roof with the teenage girl on his back. Her arms were so tight around his neck that he was struggling to breathe. He wheezed his way up, staying on his hands and knees. Night followed, hopping over him and standing there with her hands on her hips as if she hadn’t noticed they were on a burning train above a hundred-foot drop.
“You guys hear that?” Truck asked, shouting over the wind, over the roar of the fire, over the screams from the other cars. “Pan’s tip for the day, don’t stop.”
“Wow,” croaked Marlow, getting to his feet, trying to pull the girl’s hands free and only making her hang on even more tightly. “You should write a self-help book.”
Pan turned back toward the bridge. “Go scr—”
The train rumbled, seemed to shriek like a living thing. Beneath them the bottom car surrendered, tearing free and dropping earthward. A ripple of motion passed up the train, everything bouncing like a diving board. Pan watched it fall, counting to five before she saw it hit. She tried not to think about how those five long, lonely seconds would feel if she messed up now.
She took a deep breath of cold mountain air, then ran for the gap, hurling herself over it. She landed hard, touched her fingers down for a moment to steady herself. The metal beneath her was hot enough to cook burgers on. She kept going, feeling the soles of her sneakers melting on the roof, trying to trip her up.
There was a crunch as somebody landed behind her but she didn’t look back. The bridge was thirty yards away now, people visible on the tracks, climbing from the doors, ghosts in the smoke.
Another thump, a scream from the girl on Marlow’s back. Pan kept running, twenty yards, close enough now that some of the people on the bridge were pointing at her, shouting. Her sneakers weren’t sticking anymore, there was no fire on this side of the car. She slowed, gasping for air that was thick with smoke, that stank of burning flesh.
That scream again. Pan glanced back, past Truck. Marlow was on the roof of the car, the girl still clamped to his back. He looked like he was dancing, staggering from side to side, perilously close to the edge. He was groping for the girl, slapping at her.
The girl’s face was changing, like she’d eaten something that was expanding inside her. Her cheeks bulged, splitting, her eyes rolling back in their sockets. She was trying to scream again but she was just gargling blood. With a sound like a gunshot her skull cracked in two, opening up to reveal another one beneath.
No.
Pan doubled back, the electric charge a cold heat in her fingers. She was too far away, though; she stood a good chance of frying Marlow alongside the Magpie if she shot from here. Marlow was down on his knees, the Magpie choking him, his grin blazing through a sticky layer of the girl’s blood and hair. In the shimmering heat haze they didn’t look real, they looked like a piece of burning film.
Truck was already running back, but Night was there first, blurring out of sight for a second then reappearing. Her fist connected with the side of the Magpie’s head and ripped away half of the girl’s skull like a coconut. She hit him again but he didn’t even seem to notice, his arms locked tight around Marlow’s throat. Marlow was blue now, his eyes bulging like pickled eggs. With a soft whumph his trousers erupted into flames from the heat of the roof.
Screw this.
Pan stretched out her fingers and unleashed a charge, a small one. A fork of lightning burned through the air, snapping into the Magpie’s side with a deep, bone-rattling peal of thunder. He cried out and let go, falling onto his back and shuddering like he’d been Tasered. Marlow limped up, slapping at the flames and doing his best to breathe.
“Get out of the way!” Pan yelled at him, feeling the electrostatic energy build up inside her again. Marlow staggered to one side but Night was there, dashing in. She kicked the Magpie in the stomach, driving him toward the edge of the car.
“Go to hell,” she screamed, kicking out again. “Hijo de—”
The Magpie grabbed her foot, used it to pull himself up. Then he clenched her throat in one hand. Night punched him in the head, ripping away more of the girl’s face, but the Magpie held firm. He wrapped his other hand around Night, smothering her. His grin was wider than ever, looking right at Pan.
“And then there were three!” he yelled.
He clutched Night’s squirming body to his chest, then he threw himself from the roof of the train.
NIGHTFALL
Just like that, she was gone.
Marlow staggered up the train until the heat was bearable. He collapsed to his knees and craned over the edge. Night and the Magpie were two silhouettes shrinking into the tinfoil glow of the river, falling, fading. Somebody skidded down next to him—Truck, struggling to pull in a breath before howling Night’s name into the darkness. He was holding his own face with those big hands, his eyes wider and brighter than the moon.
It’s okay, he thought. They’ll land in the water, she’ll be okay.
Below, they hit the river, a silent splash that looked no bigger than a dime. Truck howled again, a sound so full of rage that it took Marlow’s breath away. Pan had staggered to his other side, and he looked up, saw her standing there with her hands in her hair, her face a phantom’s. She met his eyes and he knew instantly. He knew there was no hope.
“Oh God,” said Truck, sobbing now. “Oh God, no. No. Night! We have to … We have to…”
It was too late. Far below, the silver heart of the river was starting to foam. It was as if the sun were rising down there, a soft glow pulsing out of the water, bringing it to a hissing boil that Marlow could hear above the roar of the fire. The earth split, revealing a molten core that burned a
Night was dead.
She had died under contract with the Engine.
They were coming for her right now, pulling themselves out of the soil, out of the rock, out of the water. The demons were coming for her, and they would drag her down through the melting rock, through that suppurating hole in reality. They would drag her straight into the depths of hell.
And even now, even above the fire, above the hiss, above the shouts from the bridge, above Truck’s gasping, heartbreaking cries—even though Night was dead—he could hear her.
He could hear her scream.
He turned away, blinking fire from his vision, as if everywhere he looked, the world was burning. That’s when he felt it, felt it like somebody had rammed a knife right into the heart of him, had drawn that blade from his sternum to his gut. He opened his mouth and groaned, then he turned and wrapped his arms around Truck—just to anchor himself, to stop himself from slipping away into oblivion—felt the big guy’s whole body tremble with the force of his cries. He pushed his face into him and let it out, because there was simply nothing else he could do.
A hand on his arm, gentle but insistent. Pan was there, her face set in stone, her teeth clenched so tight that her jaw bulged Magpie-big. Her eyes were red raw and filled with something that Marlow couldn’t identify—something he didn’t want to identify.
“Let’s go,” she said quietly. Her hand hovered in front of him, and after another eternity he managed to take it, letting her lift him to his feet. They each took one of Truck’s hands and he rose like a child, his body sagging, his head tucked into his chest. His cries were silent now, but no better because of it. Only when they were sure he wasn’t going to topple off the edge did Marlow let go, Pan leading Truck up the train toward the bridge.
Goodbye, Night, Marlow said without looking down. His fists were clenched so hard, his nails had gouged trenches in his palms. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.
He followed Pan and Truck up the train, squeezing between the severed railings and dropping down onto the tracks. There had to be a hundred people here, two hundred, all of them sobbing and crying and holding one another. Marlow pushed through them, seeing wounds, missing limbs, seeing children howling for parents and parents crying for their children, seeing men and women so covered in blood that they might have been skinned alive. They were still pouring from the cars, some of them carrying the wounded and others carrying worse. The train was a dead thing that lay half on, half off its tracks, snaking into shadow, its head hanging limply over the side of the bridge. The fire was spreading, too, cremating it and everything that remained inside.